I have read Peter Singer's book Animal Liberation (I have an updated version of it) and it seems pretty strong. But, Francione's portrayal of Singer is as squish. I recall Singer saying that changing your ways but eating eggs now and again or something would be a big step. Singer didn't say it was fine to eat eggs. But, if you were regular consumer of animal products, dropping most of it except for eggs on your way to veganism would be a big step. Sort of like cutting back to a few cigs a day.
Francione, however, portrays him as a quasi-vegan, who thinks promoting veganism at some point is too absolute. Someone, who still eats animal products occasionally and praises half-measures by animal product producers, giving aid and comfort to the enemy. Someone who thinks some animals have equal moral weight as humans, but still not as equal as them. Again, having read his book, this seems a tad extreme.
I also am not sure about the general idea that limited goals are not only trivial, but probably counterproductive. I look historically and great wrongs are not attacked all at once. And, by doing that, it doesn't necessarily mean we think the wrong is fine except for some really bad examples. Take slavery. Many figured slavery just couldn't be abolished realistically while still thinking it wrong. They tried to address certain things, like the slave trade. These things were not trivial by definition.
Sherry Colb and Michael Dorf -- whose book on animal rights and abortion is part of the collection this book is part of -- also argue this. Someone like Temple Grandin who supports kinder slaughterhouse methods, and has said she thinks animals deserve protection, doesn't really help.
She just makes people think slaughtering animals is okay. But, if we slaughter animals, shouldn't we try to help them as much as we can? It's like saying prison reform is pointless without abolishing prisons. I understand the concern. But, people with problems will tell you there are degrees. Helping the degree matters a lot sometimes.
The author at times frames it in a strawman sort of way like talk of "meatless Mondays." Sure. One day without meat is trivial. But, what if you only ate meat once or twice a week without increasing your net consumption by you know tripling up? Regularly, cutting back leads to simply ending the practice. And, cutting back generally suggests the target is tainted. Why cut back otherwise?
He briefly notes that if that is the only way you are going to cut back toward a complete vegan life (focused on misuse of animals; Victoria Moran years ago spoke of a wider compassion ethic after all, humans are animals and ending their mistreatment would advance wider vegan principles), that is okay. But, that to me is the point of those who support stops along the way. I don't think many of them are saying we should not go further. Some might. Trivial improvement does deserve a bit of scorn.
Anyway, I don't think agreeing with people all the way is often necessary to agree on the basics. For instance, a core point he makes is that an animal welfare sentiment that is concerned with not mistreating animals but still treating them as property net will give you piss poor results.
The average person agrees we should treat animals "humanely," but don't want to give up much of anything. Use of animals for food, e.g., is far from necessary. It isn't a hard call (animal testing might be though alternatives exist to make it a lot harder to accept). But, our mentality allows trivial interests like personal taste to handwave abusive factory farms.
At some point, you need to accept animals as animals have moral standing, even if it somehow interferes with human interests. Some basic thing has to be involved here -- the author flags sentience (some sense of consciousness from one moment to the next contra some complex over span of time rule someone like Singer or Tom Regan supports) as the principle.
The alternative, says the author, is animals are property without any rights. The counter is that we do have animal welfare laws in place. But, he notes, look how weakly they are practiced. Why? The laws presumes animals aren't really persons with moral standing (even if they might be treated as persons in certain ways). Like a slave, this sort of thing makes it rather easy for us to find an excuse (however weak) to mistreatment them.
I'm unsure about the whole concept of "moral rights" based on sentience as a "pre-legal" thing as if it is something that is "out there" like a tomato. I think we have to realize that moral rights is a human construct, which is notable in this area. We are humans, so have to see things as humans there, even though (who knows) we are mistreating other animals in the process.
This also makes me more accepting of treating humans as having a higher status to some degree than animals. Be this "speciesism" or not, it is simply a fact of our being humans. I noted this in a comment regarding President Biden focusing so much on American troops in a speech on Afghanistan. Yes. He's the leader of the United States. He is the commander-in-chief of those forces. It is not wrong to think of them first.
This doesn't mean the rights of Afghans should be handwaved. It is very well true that such a mentality can make us make decisions that harm such rights. So, it should be done warily. The presence of nation states, however, will result in such a mentality. An international organization will be more likely to have a world-wide mentality. As an aside, that will be of special importance to protect women's rights in Afghanistan.
No matter. The basic core idea that non-human animals warrant equal treatment in some fashion is why I became a vegetarian in the 1990s. My thought was that equality was a good thing and non-human animals should be treated equal in some basic way too. As the author notes, it logically follows from our respect of animals' basic welfare. If we don't think dogs and cats should be harmed, why should pigs for pork production?
We can debate on the philosophical details here, but the bottom line holds. An animal welfare approach without respect for animals having inherent rights has only led to limited benefits. I might say more benefits than he suggests, but that is but detail. Some like myself (as he notes) will in a variety of ways be willing to accept that even animal welfare warrants veganism. But, it surely does look like something more is needed.
That something more is some basic respect for the rights of animals. Some theorists will come at this in other ways. For instance, some argue that our emotional attachment to animals is one important thing here. Emotional passions is a major driver (I have seen this over the years) for many causes. Philosophical debates on sentience will only matter so much for such people.
Still, there is some basic "it" here that is part of things. Non-human animals have interests warranting protection ("rights"). And, a consistent (though who is really consistent? the inexact, at times arbitrary, nature of human existence might warrant a bit more sympathy here) application would lead to a vegan lifestyle. Just to help things go down, there are pragmatic benefits and the lifestyle is a lot easier these days than many might think.
The book has a helpful summary of each chapter in the back (about a tenth of its 175 page length) though no index. The book is pretty straightforward though at times reads as a bit of an academic essay that might turn off some readers. It was written in 2020, but don't know how new its arguments really are. It was for me a helpful refresh of the material.
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Thanks for your .02!